Soroptimist International Durham aim to transform the lives of women and girls through education, empowerment and enabling opportunities.

Each year our Presidents choose a charity to support and this year Geraldine and Sue, Joint presidents, have chosen Endometriosis UK.

We have chosen to walk 100km as it is our Centenary this year. Two of the  Northern Saints Trails, The Way of Life (Gainford to Durham) and The Way of Love (Durham to Hartlepool) amount to that distance. Each is divided into 4 sections.  Sue and Geraldine will walk the 8 sections over a period of 4 weeks.  Other members of  SID may join them and act as a support along the way.

Saturday 13th November - What a lovely day for the first leg of our Northern Saints Walk of Life from Gainford to West Auckland. Geraldine, Vyvyenne and Sue walked 14.28Km on some beautiful tracks and through several pretty villages.

Saturday 20th November - Blessed with another beautiful warm sunny day. Geraldine, Anna, Vyvyenne and Sue walked 14.96Km from West Auckland to Bishop Auckland. There were a few tricky paths to negotiate and deciphering the route directions was challenging at times! Still lots of autumnal colours and the stretch along the River Wear, where we saw a kingfisher and heron, was looking beautiful. We also passed  Escomb Church, the oldest most complete Saxon church in England. 

Tuesday 23rd November - Another lovely day, although a lot colder. Geraldine and I walked from Bishop Auckland Castle through the Park and then along the Auckland Way. After trudging through a very muddy field we had to find an alternative route around Whitworth Hall as it was closed. All good though as we got back to the allotted Northern Saints route around Spennymoor  and then through woods to our finish in Tudhoe Village having walked 12.92Km. Many thanks to Alison for taking us to our starting point.

Tuesday 30th November - The walk today was Tudhoe to Durham. Geraldine, Vyvyenne, Janet and I covered 13Km and felt very pleased with ourselves, as instead of taking an alternative route towards the end of the walk, we climbed the 224 Steps of Doom to the top of Mount Joy and soon after we were rewarded with a wonderful view of Durham Cathedral. So ends our first Northern Saints Trail of Life and we are now half way through our challenge to cover 100km!

Saturday 4th December - Geraldine and I set off from Durham on the first section of The Way of Love. The weather was mixed with several showers, but we also had some sunshine. We discovered some new footpaths, which neither of us had trodden on before, but we also found mud, lots of it! However, we made it to Cassop on some familiar paths and as we were so close to Kelloe decided to start the next section by following the route that went passed my house. Our total was 15.4Km.

Wednesday 8th December - a shorter walk today, 8.8Km which suited both Geraldine and me as we had other commitments to slot in! We set off from my house in Kelloe and followed two lovely familiar mineral lines accompanied by my husband, friends Denise and Simon and 4 dogs. We set off in heavy rain, but lucky for us this eased up and we even saw some blue sky and sunshine as we approached our finishing point in Trimdon.

Friday 10th December - lucky for us we had a sunny day for our longest walk so far of 17.87Km from Trimdon to Hart. Another lovely varied walk with long stretches along former mineral lines and beautiful if not challenging routes, due to the sodden ground and fallen trees, through Hesledon and Nesbit Denes. Geraldine, Vyvyenne and I still found lots to chat about which helped us clock up the Kilometres. One more to go!

Wednesday 15th December - Geraldine, Vyvyenne, Janet and I were so lucky again to be walking in sunshine. The final section of the Northern Saints Trail for the Way of Love was from Hart to Hartlepool Headland, following some of the coastal footpath. We covered 9.96Km making our total 107.19Km.  My husband, Philip, volunteered to chauffeur us from home to the start and then collected us from the Headland at the finish and took us onto the Surfside Cafe, which is between Hartlepool and Seaton Carew, to celebrate with fish and chips. 

Soroptimist International Durham would like to thank everyone who has supported us and our chosen charity Endometriosis UK.